DP1 at 1 year

I've had my DP1 for just over a year  now.  It fits into my shirt pocket.

I was immediately impressed with the image quality attainable with this little camera.  In the year I have learned how to better use this tool, and how to work around it's much reviewed shortcomings.  The more I use it the more comfortable I become with it and the more I like it.  I don't believe It will ever be as comfortable and intuitive as my Nikon F, circa 1970, but it is more comfortable for me than any other digital camera I've owned, and it fits into my shirt pocket.

Digital cameras seem to fall into 2 general categories, point and shoot and DSLR.  Point and shoots are small, easy to carry, slow to use and the image quality, although improving is not in the DSLR category.  DSLR's provide great image quality but are BIG, noisy, intimidating and increasingly ridiculously expensive. The DP1 is the size of a P&S and shares some of their slowness.  The camera does provide the ability to get around some of the slowness problems and delivers images that flat knock you out.  I consider the image quality to be superior to my DSLR.  Sigma has delivered a 3rd category of digital camera, available no where else as of yet.  A high quality image maker that fits into a shirt pocket.

Perhaps the most written about shortcoming of this camera is it's slowness.  Slowness seems to fall into 4 categories, “slow” lens (f4), slow to focus, shutter lag* and slow to write to the card.  

*Shutter lag is most often a slow focus issue

Slow lens.  A faster lens would be nice but not at the expense of size.  In reality the f4 lens isn't that  big a problem.  My favorite DSLR lens is an f4 12 ~ 24mm.  So f4 is the same.  Also, without a mirror assembly to slap around causing vibration I can hand hold the DP1 at a much slower shutter speed.   With the DP1 if  “Continuous” shooting is selected 3 shots are fired dramatically improving the odds of a sharp image at a slower shutter speed.  Finally although many DSLR lenses are faster than f4 very very few of them are as good wide open as the lens on the DP1.  The lenses that are great wide open often have names like Leica or Zeiss and are wildly expensive.

Slow to focus & Shutter Lag.  I had originally not understood why DSLR's had a mirror.  It made no sense to me.  As I researched it I found that auto focus doesn't work well at all without the mirror.  The DP1 has no mirror and is subjected to the focus handicap.  They are working around it and I am led to believe that the DP2  focuses much faster in low light.  There is a really simple work around, manual focus.  First however a brief operational review of auto focus with a DSLR.  The Nikon I own has 3 auto focus selections.  In 2 of them a failure to achieve focus disables the shutter...so I automatically lose the shot.  In practice this is unusually frustrating to me.  Also, I often photograph musicians in dimly lit clubs (flash usually).  Quite often just before I release the shutter, or while I am actually pressing the shutter release, the camera will pick up something else, like a guitar string or something and change focus.  I get back home to find strings in perfect focus but not performers.  Not good at all.

Manual focus.  I liked this camera immediately but really started to appreciate it when I took a minute to consider manual focus. This is a feature I believe that isn't offered on other pocketable cameras.  The way this works is this:  the lens has a quite remarkable depth of field, even wide open.  I adjust the focus for more or less what I estimate the distance to be and the lens D.O.F. takes care of the rest.  This completely eliminates focus lag and shutter lag.  When I press it fires... instantly.  It's quite simple and it works!  For instance, f4 at 8 feet everything from 5 feet to 17 feet is in focus.  f7.1 at 8 feet everything from 3.75 feet to infinity is in focus.  How simple is that?

Slow to write to card.  This is a real slowness that has no real work around.  A faster card reduces write time slightly but it's still too long.  I believe that this is something which could be fixed, here's why.  The camera has a 3 shot buffer.  When Continuous is selected 3 images shots are taken and stored in the buffer.  The camera is “On-hold” after that for several seconds while it processes all 3 of the images.  If only one shot is taken the camera is still on hold 'till the shot is processed even though there is obviously room in the buffer for 2 more images.  Sigma!  Don't close the front door to the buffer if there is still room for more images!  Virtually all other digital cameras had the identical problem and fixed it!  Get er done!

I've taken a lot of images with the DP1. Even with eliminating 2 out of 3 of the continuous images I take, and removing the poor images the Sigma file on my eSATA drive is 135 GB and contains 12,000 images.  I'm guessing that's about half of what I actually took.

Customer service, excellent.

I have had to return the camera twice, once for dust and once because I damaged it.  In each case Sigma had a brand new replacement camera in my hands exactly 1 week after I dropped it in the mail.  The dust replacement was no charge.  I paid for the damaged camera but it was VERY reasonable.

Damage:  extending lenses are quite easy to damage while extended.  I damaged the DP1.  Sigma replaced it for $160.00 total charge.  As a reference I had previously damaged my TVS111 film camera (extending lens).  The repair cost me $180.00 + tax + S&H and although it's better it's not quite right.

Non removable lens.  Quite a bit of chatter about this on the web.  Some folks think this is a death sentence. I personally think it's whooey.  As someone once said, if you have more than one lens it's a certainty the wrong one will be on the camera.  I had my Nikon F film camera for 30 years and never really outgrew the 50mm lens.  There is a lot to be said for having one lens that really suits you and learning how to work well with it.  I have come to really appreciate wide angle perspective and although I might have wished for a wider lens I like this lens very much.

Also, Sigma appears to be planning a 3rd DP camera with perhaps a telephoto lens.  I notice today that the DP1 is on sale for $350.00.  Need 2 focal lengths, buy 2 cameras.  The DP1 has a world class lens.  A lens of that caliber is quite a steal for $350.00 and it comes with a camera attached.  What you need then is a shirt with 2 pockets.

Pixels

A lot has been written about pixels and more is sure to follow.  As a Sigma camera user I am aware of the confusion and marketing hype around this term.  Does my DP1 have 4.7 mega pixels, or 14?  Does my 10 mega pixel Nikon have 10, half of that? a quarter of that? or in reality no pixels at all.  And the question many have asked, just how many pixels on film anyway? 

I guess it depends upon where one starts and how they chose to count.  The funniest thing to me about this is that if the images aren't printed I can't see where it matters at all.  To look ultra close at an electronic image, called pixel peeping by many, has no significance other than that assigned by the peepers themselves.

Now when an image is printed then the fullness of the "Negative" comes into play.  There is a quality which might be called sharpness, clarity, impact, whatever.  The more pixels that go into the process the better the result.  Sharpness in lenses is typically measured in line pairs per mm.  The principle is easy enough to understand, the better the lens the more it can resolve.  So how do pixels and line pairs compare and how many does it take before we can't perceive a difference?  I have been under the conception that 5 line pairs per mm makes a sharp print.  Ctein in an essay on T.O.P. today argues that the human eye is capable of determining a difference in prints until they exceed 30 line pairs per mm.  WHEW!  That's a bunch.  He further argues that at today's best, printers are capable of delivering half of that or 15lp/mm.  15 lp/mm equates to about 100 megapixels at 8x10 prints.  I guess that would be about 40 mega pixels for a Foveon sensor.  Still a ton. Kinda puts the argument about 4.7 vs 14 into perspective.

Now the question about film.  Some very smart folks have written about the theoretical limits to film.  Good essays.  Wrong of course, but well written anyway.  The limiting factor for film, assuming a perfect exposure with a world class lens (ha) is the scanner.  Scanners seem to come in 2 types, drum and CCD.  Drum scanners cost a years pay and take a year or so to really learn to use.  All others in my opinion are consumer grade CCD scanners.  Some are quite expensive, some quite reasonable,  all use the same technology and produce acceptable scans but not drum scan quality.  My scanner is an Epson V700 which is actually a quite good CCD scanner, flatbed type, reasonably priced.  Although marketing rated at up to 6400 dpi, I find that I seldom scan at that level.  It just makes the files larger and doesn't seem to add much.

I have a couple of cameras with outstanding lenses and if I use a fine grain film I can actually see an improvement in scan quality all the way up to 6400 dpi.  The image with this post was taken with a Contax TVSiii.  This is an excellent film "point and shoot" with a world class Zeiss T lens.  I usually have this camera loaded with B&W film and in this instance Fuji Acros, a fine grained 100 ASA film.  Interestingly I dropped the camera just before entering the restaurant and the image isn't in perfect focus...not that it seems to matter much in this instance.

Details: I test scanned this image at increasing resolution and indeed saw a difference all the way up to 6400 dpi.  About 30% of this image was cropped out.  The pixel size of this image, 70 % of the negative is 6012 x 6967 pixels.  When I do the math that's 41.9 mega pixels.  Projecting this out indicates that a full size 35mm negative of this quality would scan to about 60 megapixels...more or less.  Further, as scanners get better perhaps there are more pixels to squeeze from this image.  Who knows.  Film still has things to teach us.

At any rate, on a cold rainy Halloween morning to have this pretty young woman bring me a cup of hot coffee and a smile was wonderful.  She was quite pleased with the print I made her.  Prints.  Good for photographers.

Prints

I've been wondering about prints a great deal recently.  I don't print very many of my images and wonder what other photographers are doing.

"Back in the old days"  B&W film was developed and then a contact sheet was printed.  As much of an art as "Seeing" in B&W is, evaluating contact sheets is probably very close.  However, all of the negatives were printed at least once even if very small.  Negatives were (still are) stored in a sheet of some sort, they were a paper type previously and now are clear plastic.  The contact sheets were stored with the negatives.  Pretty good system actually.

Now with digital we take a lot more pictures.  The image files display nice and bright, clear and large on the computer screen.  Much easier to evaluate and with the software available much easier to adjust the images as well.  That being said, an overwhelming majority of images never "See the light of day."  Also, it's a real chore to browse photos with another person.  Finding the images one wishes to show inside a folder, inside another folder, in yet another folder on a hard drive etc. Often distraction or boredom arrives before the images are found. While it's quite true that DAM software like Aperture or Lightroom can fix this problem they require some discipline around keywording.  More often than I would like to admit I've had trouble finding a particular image.

I believe I make a hundred or so images a year.  I have 2 printers at home and will also quite often use Costco and now Adorama.  They each have machines that are the equal of most custom labs and they also offer printer profiles for their printers.  With the profiles it's quite easy to get a print that's a good match with what the screen shows.  I have prints all over the house in folders.  Yes I know, folders of prints vs folders of digital images but I do look at them. I also use folios.  I like the ITOYA art profolio.  They come in many sizes and I find deals on these on line.  It's a good way to display images I think.

I've also made a few books.  I should probably do more of this.  Although the cost of the books seems high initially the actual per print cost is quite reasonable, the quality is good and improving.  

Still, if I consider my 4 star and 5 star images which I have double stored and also saved to DVD, few are printed.  

To have 5 star images not printed I'm guessing one must expect to be "Discovered" after they go.

film

Kodak introduced a new color negative film recently, Ektar 100.  It is finer grained and more saturated than Portra 160.  These images are from the first roll I shot, walking around town on an overcast day with my xPan.  When we get those heavy grey days I tend to think B&W or a subtle color film, like Portra NC.  This Ektar seems to have done quite well.  There is more than enough saturation.  The film also converts well to B&W.  I tend to prefer B&W film over color film converted to B&W but I am really liking the way this film converts.  

snapshots

Nothing unusual here.  These are snapshots.  My youngest son at one of his college hockey games, his sisters, mother and the old guy he calls dad.  He recently finished up his enlistment, 6 years, special ops.  Now he's quite close to graduating from college with a degree in Geology.  A scientist, wow!

On camera flash, Aperture priority.  I failed to let it focus properly for one picture.  Pretty simple stuff.

B&W

I shoot a lot of B&W film.  I keep a Contax TVS on my belt usually loaded with a fast T Grain film like T Max 400 (pushed to 800) or T Max 3200 or Ilford Delta 3200.  I often have a slower emulsion film loaded into the xPan and have been known to waste a few sheets of 4x5 as well.  It only makes sense then to try the DP1 for B&W.  Bottom line is that I like it for B&W, I like it a lot.

When I bought a digital camera I went from shooting 2 rolls of film a month to shooting twice that many images a day.  The expectations I have are that I will spend about as much time per image as I did in the darkroom.  How foolish am I.  Instead I have all of these images processed just enough to see they have potential and then no further.  "I'll get back to them later."

The slowness "Problem" with the DP1 is conditioning me to once again think more and shoot less.  This thinking more is absolutely crucial for B&W.  It's years of looking at tones, shapes, lines etc and trying to determine how the B&W film will see the colors.  Suddenly with digital it's all about color.  Others such as my friend Dan Sniffin have advised me that I need to slow down.   They're right of course but hey...individual images are free after all aren't they?

These images were all shot in RAW, in color of course, processed in SPP.  The process I have been using is to de saturate the image in SPP and boost the contrast a little.  I try manipulating the Fill Light slider a bit but usually don't love the results.  I save the file as TIFF and have a look at it in Aperture.  Once again it seems that few of the Aperture adjustments (or CS3 adjustments) are really needed.  I'm at the start of the learning curve.  I'm thinking there are some really good B&W's in this camera.

negative fill light

I was wandering in the rain tonight and came across a tavern that advertised "Aerialists tonight." It was early so I had a chance to look around the place, mid sized tavern with a very high ceiling.  Built into the rafters were some ropes, drapes and a small trapeze.  I found a spot in front of a 6 foot high jukebox which offered me a flat stable surface and a bit of protection from the folks who crowded in just before showtime.  

So many people squeezed in that I'm sure we were way over the fire marshal's limit and more kept coming in.  Once I put my arms up to situate the camera it was almost impossible to put them down again.  A pickpocket would easily have robbed anyone near but probably not have been able to get away.  

It's funny I suppose but a guy kinda bumped into me a couple of times and then looks at me and says, quite demanding "I'm trying to get through, EXCUSE ME!!!"  WTF?  "You'd better be able to fly then ass hole."

Oh well.  Couple of shots here.  It was very dark.  I was shooting full open, ISO800 and -2 or even -3 EV so either 3200 ISO or 6400 ISO.  None of my images are very good, the aerialists moved quickly and constantly but it is interesting to me how Negative Fill Light works here.  Top image AUTO in SPP, next image has negative fill light applied.  It seems to work the way a spotlight would have worked.  No particular manipulation, I did crop a bit to take nearbye heads out.  The 3rd image is just to kinda show the height of the ceiling.